Wednesday 18th: on the road to Tularosa, and welcoming reception

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Between Santa Fe and Tularosa we enjoyed spectacular panoramic landscapes.

The previous day had been exhausting: early wake up, breakfast, transfer to the senior center, presentation, lunch, trip to Abiquiu, presentation, dinner, trip to Santa Fe and intensive night visit, ending up with a late bedding down. So it was not surprising that many members of the group fell asleep like little angels in the almost 4 hours of travel we had to Tularosa.


When we woke up that same morning, outside it was... -9ºC! (16ºF)

We were impressed by those roads with tens of kilometers of pure straight stretch.

The anecdote of that morning: technical stop to not pee.

Zambomba and cazalla, road companions...
David Greenwald, historian and archaeologist of Tularosa, had recommended that, if we had time during the trip, we should visit some petroglyphs along the way before arriving, so there we went.


Carved on volcanic rock, there were many of them all around.

Some of the designs are currently used to decorate objects.

As soon as we arrived in Tularosa, the local organizing committee had prepared an official reception ceremony for us in the City Council's plenary hall, and offered us many different kinds. A luxury premonition of what was to be their warm welcome during the two days and two nights we were there.


Jen proudly shows the poster that Joan had designed with love and professionalism.



Alejandro, Edmundo and Manuel with their host Cindy.
 
In addition to the bag with gifts, they also gave us a personalized thank you card.

After the official welcome, including a snack with what they call biscochitos (more similar to what we in Spain call mantecados), we went to have some drinks at the Casa de los Sueños restaurant with the families and friends that were going to host us those days.






And after the beers and nachos with hot sauce, we were invited to dinner in the ball room adjacent to the church where we were going to perform the next day.


It was interesting to use the tray as a dish...

Evening gathering in the rural house where the largest group was hosted.

Another long tiring day, and the next one was not going to be less...

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